Tsunami field survey of the 1992 Nicaragua earthquake

Satake, Kenji; Bourgeois, Joanne; Abe, Kuniaki; Abe, Katsuyuki; Tsuji, Yosuke; Imamura, Fumihiko; Lio, Yoshihisa; Katao, Hiroshi; Noguera, Evelyn; Estrada, Francisco

doi:10.1029/93eo00271

Cited by 87 publications

(44 citation statements)

References 5 publications

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“…The characteristics of this kind of earthquakes are the slow rupture velocity, the long duration, the shallow dipping thrust fault and the shallow focus (Pelayo and Wiens, 1992;Okal and Newman, 2001;López and Okal, 2006;Okal and Borrero, 2011). The analysis of the Nicaragua 1992 earthquake confirmed this earthquake as a slow tsunami earthquake Imamura et al, 1993;Satake, 1994;Velasco et al, 1994) in a subduction interface with low rigidity (Satake et al, 1993;Piatanesi et al, 1996).…”

Section: Local Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 85%

Tsunami hazard assessment in El Salvador, Central America, from seismic sources through flooding numerical models.

Álvarez‐Gómez

Aniel-Quiroga

Gutiérrez

et al. 2013

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. El Salvador is the smallest and most densely populated country in Central America; its coast has an approximate length of 320 km, 29 municipalities and more than 700 000 inhabitants. In El Salvador there were 15 recorded tsunamis between 1859 and 2012, 3 of them causing damages and resulting in hundreds of victims. Hazard assessment is commonly based on propagation numerical models for earthquake-generated tsunamis and can be approached through both probabilistic and deterministic methods. A deterministic approximation has been applied in this study as it provides essential information for coastal planning and management. The objective of the research was twofold: on the one hand the characterization of the threat over the entire coast of El Salvador, and on the other the computation of flooding maps for the three main localities of the Salvadorian coast. For the latter we developed high-resolution flooding models. For the former, due to the extension of the coastal area, we computed maximum elevation maps, and from the elevation in the near shore we computed an estimation of the run-up and the flooded area using empirical relations. We have considered local sources located in the Middle America Trench, characterized seismotectonically, and distant sources in the rest of Pacific Basin, using historical and recent earthquakes and tsunamis. We used a hybrid finite differencesfinite volumes numerical model in this work, based on the linear and non-linear shallow water equations, to simulate a total of 24 earthquake-generated tsunami scenarios. Our results show that at the western Salvadorian coast, run-up values higher than 5 m are common, while in the eastern area, approximately from La Libertad to the Gulf of Fonseca, the run-up values are lower. The more exposed areas to flooding are the lowlands in the Lempa River delta and the Barra de Santiago Western Plains. The results of the empirical approximation used for the whole country are similar to the results obtained with the high-resolution numerical modelling, being a good and fast approximation to obtain preliminary tsunami hazard estimations. In Acajutla and La Libertad, both important tourism centres being actively developed, flooding depths between 2 and 4 m are frequent, accompanied with high and very high person instability hazard. Inside the Gulf of Fonseca the impact of the waves is almost negligible.

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Section: Local Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 85%

Tsunami hazard assessment in El Salvador, Central America, from seismic sources through flooding numerical models.

Álvarez‐Gómez

Aniel-Quiroga

Gutiérrez

et al. 2013

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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“…Field survey of tsunami run-up heights Satake et al 1993) showed that the maximum tsunami run-up height was 9.9 m above mean sea level, although the maximum intensity in Modified Mercalli scale was only III. This weak intensity with a large tsunami indicates that this was an unusual 'tsunami earthquake' (Satake 1994).…”

Section: Tsunami Numerical Simulationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The 1992 Nicaragua earthquake occurred off the Pacific coast of Central America and generated a much larger tsunami than expected from its surface wave magnitude of M s 7.2; so the earthquake is classified as a 'tsunami earthquake' (Satake et al 1993). Seismological analysis of the earthquake (Ide et al 1993, Kanamori andKikuchi 1993) and tsunami waveform analysis (Satake 1994) showed that the seismic moment M 0 is 3-4 9 10 20 Nm (Mw = 7.6-7.7).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Method to Determine Appropriate Source Models of Large Earthquakes Including Tsunami Earthquakes for Tsunami Early Warning in Central America

Tanioka

Miranda

Gusman

et al. 2017

Pure Appl. Geophys.

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Abstract-Large earthquakes, such as the Mw 7.7 1992 Nicaragua earthquake, have occurred off the Pacific coasts of El Salvador and Nicaragua in Central America and have generated distractive tsunamis along these coasts. It is necessary to determine appropriate fault models before large tsunamis hit the coast. In this study, first, fault parameters were estimated from the W-phase inversion, and then an appropriate fault model was determined from the fault parameters and scaling relationships with a depth dependent rigidity. The method was tested for four large earthquakes, the 1992 Nicaragua tsunami earthquake (Mw7.7), the 2001 El Salvador earthquake (Mw7.7), the 2004 El Astillero earthquake (Mw7.0), and the 2012 El Salvador-Nicaragua earthquake (Mw7.3), which occurred off El Salvador and Nicaragua in Central America. The tsunami numerical simulations were carried out from the determined fault models. We found that the observed tsunami heights, run-up heights, and inundation areas were reasonably well explained by the computed ones. Therefore, our method for tsunami early warning purpose should work to estimate a fault model which reproduces tsunami heights near the coast of El Salvador and Nicaragua due to large earthquakes in the subduction zone.

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“…It was a tsunami earthquake that ruptured probably the shallowest section of the subduction interface (Satake, 1994;Velasco et al, 1994). Its effects were very destructive in Nicaragua, where wave heights reached more than 9 m, but the tsunami was recorded along the Salvadorian and Costa Rican pacific coast of Central America too (Baptista et al, 1993;Femandez and Alvarado-Delgado, 2005;Femandez et al, 2004;Satake et al, 1993).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tsunamigenic potential of outer-rise normal faults at the Middle America trench in Central America

Álvarez‐Gómez¹,

Gutiérrez²,

Aniel-Quiroga³

et al. 2012

Tectonophysics

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Keywords: Tsunami Middle America trench Central America Outer-rise earthquakes SubductionThe Middle America trench is formed by the subduction of the Cocos and Rivera plates under the Caribbean and North American plates. The subduction interface presents low coupling in Central America showing its seismicity a high frequency of outer-rise normal fault earthquakes. These outer-rise earthquakes are gener ated on the inherited structures of the seafloor-spreading fabric during the subducting plate bending. We analyze focal mechanism data in combination with the available structural data of the outer-rise normal faults in order to constrain the rupture characteristics of the outer-rise normal earthquakes. A new empirical scaling relationship is developed to define earthquake magnitudes from normal fault dimensions in the outer-rise context. We numerically model the tsunami wave propagation due to the worst outer-rise tsunamigenic source in the area to estimate its damaging potential. Wave elevations higher than 2 m are common at the coast in front of the fault extent, with maximum wave elevations of 8 m. The capability of these faults to generate ocean-wide tsunamis is low, however, they can produce significant tsunamis locally.

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Tsunami field survey of the 1992 Nicaragua earthquake

Cited by 87 publications

References 5 publications

Tsunami hazard assessment in El Salvador, Central America, from seismic sources through flooding numerical models.

Tsunami hazard assessment in El Salvador, Central America, from seismic sources through flooding numerical models.

Method to Determine Appropriate Source Models of Large Earthquakes Including Tsunami Earthquakes for Tsunami Early Warning in Central America

Tsunamigenic potential of outer-rise normal faults at the Middle America trench in Central America

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